Carlsbad scuttled plans this week for a 20-unit timeshare resort on a 1-acre lot that’s been used for launching boats and personal watercraft on Carlsbad’s Agua Hedionda Lagoon since the 1950s.

Although the proposal met all city and California Coastal Commission requirements for the site, the City Council found it was incompatible with the nearby homes and denied the necessary permits. The vote was 3-2, with Councilmen Michael Schumacher and Mark Packard in favor of the plan.

“I’m kind of bitter,” said project applicant James Courtney, who with partner Michael Pfankuch has been working with the city and the California Coastal Commission for 15 years to find an acceptable project for the site.

Now they don’t know what’s next, Courtney said.

The two men have owned the property — along Adams Avenue on the northern shore of the lagoon — since 1985.

Once known as Whitey’s Landing, it was one of two places on the lagoon where people could launch their boats in the 1950s. The other is Snug Harbor, just east of Interstate 5.

Over the years, a few large single-family homes have been built along Adams Street near the lagoon. The old landing has held a series of restaurants and — more recently — a school for kayaking and stand-up paddleboarding lessons. In the 1970s, a marina condominium community, Bristol Cove, was built just a few lots away.

The 1-acre lot is the only one in the area that’s still zoned for commercial recreation, and the Coastal Commission staff has said it should stay that way.

Courtney and Pfankuch’s latest proposal, called the Carlsbad Boat Club & Resort, meets that requirement. It was downsized from a previous plan that the council rejected in 2008. Studies showed it would generate about 200 vehicle trips a day, less than a restaurant or almost anything else that could be built on the site.

“It’s the least impact of anything we can do,” Courtney said. “The other alternative is just to re-open the restaurant.”

Residents say Adams Street is too narrow and winding to handle any additional traffic, and that more boat trailers on the road would be especially hazardous to pedestrians and cyclists.

Carlsbad’s city staff initially recommended the project be approved, saying it met all city requirements, and that the road could handle the small amount of additional traffic.

City Council members, however — like the Planning Commission earlier this year — were swayed by the arguments of nearby residents who opposed to the project.

Mayor Matt Hall said the decision could have gone either way, but that he puts “a lot of faith in our Planning Commission,” and so he agreed with the panel’s conclusion that the proposed resort is incompatible with the surrounding uses.

Schumacher, who voted the other way, also said it was a tough decision.

“This is a land use that has been in play for many, many years,” he said, before ultimately supporting the owners right to develop the property.